Rainbow Samurai

Not Without a Fight…!

Rainbow Dash, Gilda, and Fluttershy were enjoying their lunch together; more so Rainbow and Fluttershy, seeing as Gilda had shown little to no interest in the timid yellow filly. Whereas all the Pegasi sat together in groups at specially-selected tables around the cafeteria, Rainbow and Gilda normally sat alone together in one of the far corners of the lunchroom. Here, they’d enjoy conversation about basically anything, from their shared love of flying at high speeds to their wildly different tastes in food, considering that ponies were vegetarian while griffins were not.

“So… Fluttershy. What’s the deal with you?” Rainbow asked as she bit into a large, juicy red apple.

“Oh! Well… I’m a new student here. I used to be home schooled, but my parents started being… at work all the time. My mom’s at work so often now that daddy tells me she only comes in when I’m asleep, so I never see her. Even when I try to wake up really early to give her a hug, I can never catch her.”

“Wow, you’re new here? Funny I haven’t seen you until today,” Rainbow replied with a mouthful of peanut butter and jelly. She swallowed the piece of sandwich and took a sip of her milk carton before continuing. “And my mom’s always at work, too… or at least, she used to be. Now she’s home all the time.”

“Oh, my… I wish my mom was home all the time. I only ever hear her when I’m supposed to be asleep and my daddy waits for her. When she does get home, I think daddy gets really excited to see her because they start shouting with joy and throwing things. Sometimes, I want to go down and have fun with them, but daddy tells me that the kind of fun they have is fun only mommies and daddies are supposed to have.” That last statement piqued Gilda’s interest.

“You sure the kind of ‘fun’ they have isn’t actually them just foolin’ around in bed?” Rainbow Dash snickered at Gilda’s shockingly adult joke, but the innocent little Fluttershy was totally oblivious.

“I’m sorry… but I don’t know what you mean,” Fluttershy responded. “They’re not in bed when I hear them having fun. And they throw things while they celebrate mommy coming home.”

“Uh huh…” was all Gilda could say with a raised eyebrow before returning to her strip of animal flesh.

“Um… Gilda? If you don’t mind me asking… what is that?”

“Beef jerky.”

“Beef… jerky?”

“Yeah. Don’t you—? Oh, right. You ponies don’t eat meat.”

“Meat? What is ‘meat’?” Gilda gawked at the naïve little filly.

“You seriously don’t know what it is? Dash, you know. You tell her.”

“Um… I don’t really get it myself, but from what Gilda told me, it’s… um… it’s…” Rainbow, unable to find a good choice of words, leaned in and whispered into Fluttershy’s ear, “Dead animals made into food…” Fluttershy’s eyes went wide as dinner plates as she gasped in horror.

“Animals?? Y-you mean… like fluffy little bunnies…? A-and cows that go ‘moo?’ And cute little piggies and deer and other creatures?”

“Hah! Oh man, you’re such a softy! But yeah, basically,” said Gilda. The terror in Fluttershy’s eyes was comparable to if she had watched someone die in front of her…

“Yyyyeah, changing the subject,” Rainbow suggested, seeing her new friend’s discomfort. “…How—?”

“Dashie…” Rainbow froze as she thought she’d heard a quiet voice coming from absolutely nowhere calling her name. The voice, while sounding very familiar, sounded like it was in a lot of pain. It echoed in her mind as if she were in a cave. “Dashie…” The voice called again in the same melody of anguish. The voice’s owner became clear to her… the voice she was hearing belonged to none other than her mother, Daring Do. The small blue Pegasus went catatonic with a sense of panic as she’d begun having a sinking feeling of fear washing over her. “Dashie… Help me…”

“Um… Rainbow Dash? Are you okay?” asked Fluttershy, taking note of her friend’s sudden shock. The blue filly didn’t respond; she still remained stiff as board with her eyes wide open and staring down at the lunch table.

“Dashie… Mommy needs you… Help me…”

“Rainbow Dash?” Fluttershy placed a hoof on Rainbow’s shoulder, making her flinch violently as she snapped out of her trance. Gilda, ignorant of the cause of Rainbow’s trance, laughed at her.

“Wow, Dash! I never expected you of all ponies to zone out like that.”

“Uh, yeah… zoning out…” she agreed with an uneasy chuckle. Try as she might, however, she couldn’t shake the apprehensive feeling in her gut. The voice she’d heard… it sounded so real… JUST like Daring Do, even. But Daring was supposed to be at home, coping with her mental illness. Why would she need Rainbow’s help with anything? And why did she sound like she was in so much excruciating pain? Rainbow’s thoughts were bombarded with fearful premonitions about possible dangers her mother was facing.

Back in the physical realm, three very familiar colts approached their table, lunches in hoof: The first one brown with a slightly brighter brown mane that covered his eyes and a series of bruises and scratches, the second one orange with a dark brown mane styled smilarly to the first colt and an absorbent patch taped over his left nostril, and the third one black with a mane of a bright, icy blue with stripes of a slightly brighter blue that was styled up into a gladiator mohawk. He was the only one of the three whose eyes were visible. They were a golden brown. He had an ice pack taped to his cheek.

“What do YOU geeks want?” Gilda aggressively asked. “We already kicked your flanks once. Don’t make us do it again!”

“Yeah!” Rainbow agreed.

“Listen, we just… wanted to say we’re sorry for earlier,” the brown colt began.

“We shouldn’t have been picking on Fluttershy like we did,” the black colt continued. “We… we don’t have many other friends other than each other…”

“…and we figured it was because everypony was afraid of us. So we made the best of it and started giving everypony a reason to be scared,” said the orange colt.

“Well look where THAT got you!” Rainbow shot back.

“I know,” the brown colt responded. “That’s… that’s why we decided to stop bullying other ponies. Instead, we want to make new friends. Starting with you, Rainbow Cra—! I mean uh… Dash. No hard feelings?” he asked as he extended a hoof. Rainbow was predictably apprehensive at first, given that this was the very colt she’d beaten up not too long before for bullying the new friend she’d just made. She glanced at Fluttershy to see her shaking hooves with the black colt and smiling warmly at him like nothing had happened. Gilda simply turned away, folding her fore legs, but keeping an eye open, looking at her.

“…Fine.” Rainbow finally agreed after much contemplation. “But NO funny business! And NO bullying! It’s seriously uncool,” she added as she touched her hoof with the colt’s.

“Scout’s honor,” he gratefully promised. “My name’s Flight Path, by the way.”

“I’m Trailblazer,” said the orange colt.

“And I’m Thunderlane,” said the black colt as the trio joined their new friends at the table to enjoy their lunch.

Daring made haste in trying to take down the largest of the three Dark Hoof agents, quickly swinging the blade at him. He repelled the sword with his hidden knife blade. She stepped back, charged at him once more and clashed with him again and again, trying to find a way to break his defense. He effectively countered her slashes and slammed his other fore hoof into the adventure mare’s stomach, knocking her back and into the coffee table. The table shattered upon impact as the Pegasus crashed into it. She recovered quickly despite the series of cuts she’d acquired on various sections of her body and face. She shook her head, picked her sword back up and charged the large stallion again. As he prepared for another counterattack, she surprised him by leaping over and landing behind him. The instant she landed, she threw both her hind legs back, placing a strong, well-aimed buck into the stallion’s left hind leg.

*SNAP* He shouted in pain as he was forced onto his haunches as Daring had just broken his leg. The other two Pegasi on either side of her reacted immediately, each of them thrusting their knives at Daring repeatedly. She reflexively dodged their simultaneous attack and countering with a swing of her sword to her right. The mare narrowly avoided decapitation as she ducked, and had tried countering by thrusting her knife at the adventure mare again.

*CHING* Daring had just barely managed to block the mare’s counterattack. The two entered a power struggle as they vehemently pushed their weapons against each other, neither of them backing down. The small stallion took this distraction as a chance to swing his blade at the adventure mare.

*SLICE* He successfully managed to land a strike on the mare as she groaned in pain. He’d managed to make a deep incision just under Daring’s left wing. She faltered in her struggle against the mare and received an additional blow to her face, knocking her back into the remains of the coffee table on her rump. Her sword landed in front of her. Thinking quickly, she felt around the mess, grabbed a shard of glass with her left hoof and had moved her right one to cover up the wound, making sure to conceal the makeshift weapon as best she could all the while.

“I don’t get it… why are you fighting a battle you know you can’t win?” asked the stallion as he wiped the blood on his blade off on the floor.

“Just tell us where the Element is, and we’ll leave peacefully. You may have… NRGH! Momentarily incapacitated me, but you are still outnumbered three to one…” said the injured stallion, standing up, but making sure his hind leg didn’t touch the ground. The three slowly approached the ailing mare.

“You… you must be bad at counting then… hah… hah…” Daring’s words were strained with fatigue and agony, but she still held her confidence strong.

“What do you mean?” asked the smaller stallion. Daring chuckled menacingly.

“I mean… that there’s only TWO of you…”

“Wha—?” before he could finish his question, Daring, in one fell swoop, gripped her sword in between her teeth, picked herself up, and engaged him while still clutching her wound with her right hoof. He’d just narrowly blocked her attack, lifting his blade just in front of his face as Daring clashed with him. The mare took this as an opportunity to disable Daring’s other wing. The injured stallion could see something shining where Daring Do was clutching her wound. While he couldn’t make out a complete image of what it was, he instantly knew the treasure hunter had a trick up her sleeve. He then glanced to see his partner preparing herself for a preemptive strike.

“Agent Stealth, do NOT engage!” the large stallion shouted. He was too late in his warning as his comrade impulsively lunged at Daring with her blade extended. Daring, being cunning, predicted this and, revealing a particularly large, jagged shard of glass held in the hoof she was initially using to cover up her wound, she disengaged the small stallion by stepping back and slashing the glass across his face. She then used her free hoof to land a powerful left hook on him in the same area in which she’d struck him with the glass, and turned to her right to thrust the glass forward.

*KSH!* The adventure Pegasus hit her mark, embedding the glass deep into the belligerent Dark Hoof mare’s throat. It was a gruesome sight to behold. The mare stumbled and fell onto her back, clutching her throat as she pawed at the shard of glass protruding from her neck. She’d tried to scream, but the only sound she was making was a grotesque, wheezy gurgling noise as blood poured from her fatal wound like running water out of an overflowing bathtub. The stallions watched in what could be assumed to be absolute terror as their downed teammate writhed in merciless agony as she tried to pry the glass from her throat. It took a mere couple of minutes before she’d stopped moving or breathing and rolled onto her side. The three combatants sat in silence after watching the Dark Hoof mare’s grisly demise.

“…I didn’t want to… AGH! Do that,” Daring finally said, breaking the silence as she clutched her bleeding wound while still holding her sword in her left hoof. “But you guys forced my hoof. You can leave now and take your fallen comrade with you… hah… hah… or I can end you both… like I had to do her.”

“…I do hope you realize that your death is no longer an option…” began the larger stallion in an eerily calm tone.

“Well that’s fanta—!”

“It is now our primary objective!” the smaller stallion sternly interrupted as he wiped blood from the new opening in his mask. He then readied himself for another assault. The larger stallion also readied himself, despite being handicapped.

“Great…” she irritably muttered. She was getting physically and mentally tired. She was covered in stinging scratches from crashing into her coffee table, her knife wound was still bleeding despite her effort to stop it by holding it, and she had two stallions trying to take her life. Even if one of them had a broken leg, he still seemed like he was determined to fight. She also still had to deal with his assistant, who’d only had a scratch and a possible bruise on his face. If she were lucky enough, he might’ve caught a cold and knocked himself out.

She’d figured she was fighting a losing battle and that she had very little diversity in her options. She couldn’t run or fly away because that would mean she’d abandon the Element and leave it in their clutches if they didn’t follow suit. She’d also risk opening the wound under her left wing wider than it already was, thus infecting the wound with the amount of open air that would blow into it. Even if she were able to escape and the two stallions didn’t find the Element… they’d likely find some way to bring harm to Rainbow Dash as a form of “negotiation,” and that was something Daring was NOT going to have on her conscience. So she did the only sensible thing she could do; she’d prayed that she’d pull through this fight alive and manage to keep Rainbow Dash from harm, and readied herself for the long haul…

“Prepare to die, treasure hunter!” cried the smaller stallion as he lunged at his target. Daring Do came to grips with the situation at hand, took a deep breath and took a defensive stance.

“I’m sorry, Dashie…”

The school day had ended and Rainbow had said her goodbyes to her friends. This was a particularly good day for her. She went through the same motions as before, but she beat up a colt despite what she’d heard about colts being stronger than fillies, she’d defended someone and made a new friend, AND she’d manage to make friends with the same colts she fought. She didn’t mind being alone with Gilda for as long as she’d been, but she’d found much more excitement in making new friends and getting to know them. As she was about to take off to the grocery store, however, that creeping, ominous feeling crawled back to the front of her mind.

“Dashie… Mommy needs you… Mommy loves you… Dashie…”

Rainbow’s heart had begun pounding in her chest like a jackhammer as her premonition only seemed to become more extreme. She found herself freezing in fear at her thoughts just like she did in the cafeteria earlier. She quickly snapped herself out of it and decided to go straight home rather than make any side trips. She just HAD to know that her mother wasn’t in danger.

“Mom… I hope you’re okay…” she said to herself as she took off at top speed, slowing down for nothing.

Daring had parried the first of the two remaining agents' attack, only to be rushed by the other. He didn’t hesitate to attempt to stab her. She barely dodged it, receiving a gash in her right side, and countered by bashing him over the head with the hilt of her sword. He stumbled back from the blow. Unfortunately, she’d left herself open for an attack from her first assailant. With a quick swipe of his knife, he’d managed to make a ghastly incision on her cheek that ran from just under her left eye down to her chin. She shouted in pain as she took a couple steps back and raised her right hoof to inspect the damage.

“That’s just a taste of what you’ll be feeling,” the smaller stallion taunted.

“Hmph… You think THAT’S… ngh…! Enough to stop me?” Daring Do defiantly shot back, albeit beginning to feel the effects of her prolonged blood loss. She’d started feeling nauseous and light-headed as everything around her began to get blurry.

“Don’t pretend like your bravado is lessening the gravity of this situation,” the larger stallion said. “We see it in you already. You are weak. Tired. You’ve been bleeding profusely for a long enough time that you’ve lost some of your coordination. Your end is near, Daring Do. Hand us the Element, and we’ll make sure you won’t suffer in death.”

“I… I told you before…! You’ll get your… ngh…! Filthy hooves on that Element over… hah… over MY DEAD BODY!” with that, she aggressively charged at the duo, sword in hoof for one final effort. She swung quickly, yet erratically, the two dodging her less than tactical barrage of slashes as her vertigo was starting to get the best of her due to her constant movement. She’d lost all regard for whatever she was hitting, as she’d knocked over vases, cut plants, and made cuts all over anything her sword was in reach of, with the exception of her intended targets.

“Enough of this,” the larger stallion calmly stated, growing bored of the defensive. He ducked under a particularly powerful swing of Daring’s. She lost her balance and stumbled forward. He saw the opportunity and rammed his head into her abdomen. He sent her flying into a wall on the other side of the room.

*CRACK* “AAH-uh!” Daring grunted as a sharp, stabbing pain shot through her back. Not wasting time, the two agents lined up juxtaposed to one another.

“You’ve met with a terrible fate, haven’t you?” said the smaller stallion in a false sense of concern. He seemed to be bitter about something… possibly that he’d watched his teammate die in battle… “You could have complied with us… given us the Element and went along with the rest of your life, possibly millions of bits richer. But no. You HAD to fight. You HAD to kill her. Now… now you HAVE to die!”

“You’re… blaming this all on me…?” Daring asked, although dizzy, tired, and in excruciating pain. “You… you bastard…! I’m fighting… to protect myself. I’m fighting… to protect my daughter…I don’t… have a choice at this point… You and your Dark Hoof cult have made my life a living Hell… for over a year! I didn’t want your… filthy money. I figured you guys must have had… some shady way of getting it, especially considering how much you… were offering me, coupled with the fact that none of the offers had the same return address… I’d never even heard of you until then… but I told you every single time, I had no intention of selling that necklace… it has too rich a history behind it for me to place any material price on it…”

“We could’ve been much faster in finding out its powers. You haven’t found anything out, evidently.”

“And… you know why? It’s because… you monsters have been cutting my time with it short… trying to kill me because I wouldn’t… sell it to you… You and your disgusting Dark Hoof cult has driven me insane… to the point where I couldn’t even raise my daughter, much less… research that necklace… which tells me a lot about… your REAL intentions. You don’t want peace in the world… for all I know… you probably want to use it for your own nefarious purposes… which is why… like I said before… you’re getting that necklace… over my… dead… body…”

“Humph! You’re already halfway there… Allow us to see you the rest of the way…” with that, the smaller stallion charged at the adventure mare with the larger one following close behind.

“Hmph… lead the way…” Daring was simply sitting leaned up against the wall she’d been rammed into. She’d known this was it… that her death was all but imminent. However, she wasn’t completely afraid. She welcomed it. She’d figured long ago that her perilous expeditions would likely get her killed one day… the only thing she didn’t expect was that she’d die not in some far reaches or secret caverns or abandoned temples in another continent, but in her own home. Nonetheless, the mare stood on her hind hooves, her sword in her left fore hoof, closed her eyes, and braced herself for the inevitable.

“Time to end th—!” *KSH* *SKSH* Daring Do had felt a nerve-wracking shockwave of agony coming from her the left side of her abdomen. As she gasped and her eyes forced themselves open, she also found that she’d managed to impale the smaller stallion through his chest. She’d pulled one last trick in feigning surrender, then lashing out in one final attack before she met her end. The larger stallion removed his blade from Daring’s stomach and allowed a new river of blood to exit her already severely damaged body. She slid to the ground in terrible anguish as she let go of the sword and laid a hoof on her new open wound. The smaller stallion fell back, clutching the sword that found a resting place firmly implanted in his midsection. Blood was pouring out of both the wounds and out of his mouth.

*SLAM*

“MOMMY!” shouted the voice of a young filly. She was absolutely horrified at the sight she beheld. The room had looked trashed. Broken glass and various other materials everywhere, blood practically painting the floor, one dead mare on the floor with her face in a puddle of blood and a shard of glass sticking from her neck, one dead stallion with a sword stuck through his chest and protruding from his back that was drenched in more blood, one living stallion who seemed to be keeping one of his hind legs from touching the ground… and the most devastating sight of all, a dying goldenrod mare lying up against a wall, covered in blood, cuts, and scratches, her head hung low while her hoof was covering a deep wound, with the one live stallion standing over her but looking back at the filly.

“Rainbow… Dash…” Daring Do weakly said as she picked her head up to look at her daughter. Rainbow wasted no time running up to her dying mother and cuddling up against her, despite dirtying her coat with the oozing red liquid her mother was already practically bathed in. With what little strength she had left, Daring lifted her hoof off of her wound and rested it around her daughter.

“Mommy! What’s going on!? What happened!? Why are you all beat up like this!?” the filly asked question after question as she went into a state of utter panic and began sobbing openly.

“I’m… so, so sorry, Dashie…” Daring weakly began, straining every word as tears of heartbreak welled up in her eyes. “I… should’ve… told you sooner… I… some bad ponies don’t want me to be alive… Because of that necklace I found…” Rainbow instantly knew the necklace Daring was talking about; the gold one with the red lightning bolt on it.

“Why didn’t you give it away!? Why did you keep it if bad ponies wanted to take you away from me for it!?” Rainbow’s sobbing hadn’t let up in the slightest. In fact, she began to cry harder.

“I… probably should have… given it away… but the bad ponies don’t deserve it… That necklace is very special… It has the power to help a… lot of ponies… It was selfish of me to keep it… because I… I put myself in terrible danger… and worse… I put you in danger, Dashie…” Daring Do began to weep openly as she shared her final moments with her daughter. “Now… now mommy has to go away…”

“No! Mommy, please! Please don’t go! You said you would take me on one of your adventures one day! You promised you’d never leave me all alone! Remember!? I-I’m sorry for what I said this morning! Mommy, don’t go! Please! I-I love you!” Rainbow desperately pleaded as her sorrowful tears ran free. The implausible amount of sheer hurt in the filly’s eyes reminded Daring of the time she’d found her. That look cut into her her ten times deeper than the mortal wounds she sustained in her battle.

“My only regret… is that I don’t get to… watch you grow into a beautiful young mare… I… I love you, my little Dashie… Live your life well… Make mommy proud…” With that, the last signs of life in Daring Do had withered away, leaving behind a devastated, heartbroken Pegasus filly cuddling her now lifeless body. Rainbow, still not moving from her position, turned to the injured stallion while she cried.

“…Why…? Why did the bad ponies do this to her?” she asked as she wept, her voice shaky with profound sadness. “She didn’t do anything wrong… She was innocent… Why? Why did they take my mommy away from me?”

“I… I’m sorry you had to see this, young one,” the stallion apologized, a strong sense of guilt evident in his voice. “It… was not my intention to… to hurt you or your mother.” Rainbow, though her eyes were blurred with grieving tears, examined the stallion and noticed the blood-stained knife attached to his hoof. She then took a look at Daring Do’s mortal husk and noticed the stab wound in her stomach. She quickly figured out what had happened to end her mother’s life, and was instantly fueled with pure rage.

“YOU DID THIS, DIDN’T YOU!?” she shouted, alarming the Dark Hoof agent. “YOU TOOK MY MOMMY AWAY FROM ME! AND YOU DID IT ON PURPOSE! YOU STABBED HER! I SEE THE BLOOD ON YOUR KNIFE! I HATE YOU! I HATE YOU! I HATE YOU! I HATE YOU!” she exploded as she charged the stallion in a feeble effort to get her revenge. She swung at him wildly, trying her best to harm him. He did nothing to stop her. He absorbed the miniscule blows, feeling as if he’d deserved every single one of them. Rainbow kicked his fore legs repeatedly, and then took flight in order to hit him across the face a few times before she landed back on the ground, tiring herself out while she sobbed uncontrollably.

“I... I am sorry, young filly,” he said again as he gently laid a hoof on her head. Expectantly, she swatted it away and glared at him with such a deathly sense of hatred and anger that it’d scare even the biggest of monsters. The stallion, trying to find a way to ease the filly’s immeasurable despair, grabbed Daring Do’s sword and with a strong tug, pulled it out of his comrade’s corpse. “It’s… pretty ironic. We’re supposed to be bringing peace to all the ponies in the world… and yet, here I am, standing as the culprit of a cold-blooded murder and the destroyer of a foal’s innocence…” he mumbled, more so to himself than the filly who was busy bawling her eyes out in torment. He then placed the sword down in front of the filly, prompting her to remove her fore hooves from her teary magenta eyes to stare at the bloodied object. He then took it upon himself to remove his mask and goggles to reveal that he had a deep red coat, a snow white mane, and blazing orange eyes. He had a large scar running down from his left eyebrow, past his eye, and down to the corner of his mouth. He’d also shown signs of aging as there were wrinkles on his eyelids and cheeks. Rainbow looked up at him, studying every feature of the stallion before her. He stared back at her with utmost severity.

“Remember this face, filly; for it is the face of your mother’s killer. Remember this voice. For it is the voice of the death of your innocence. Remember this day, for it will be the fuel you’ll need… for our grudge match. If you wish to avenge your mother, you will learn how to fight and survive as she did. If you do not, you will die as she did. We, the Dark Hoof Seven Tribe, will come for you once again, whether you are ready or not. As far as you are concerned, you are now the possessor of the Element of Loyalty.” After finishing his speech, the stallion put his mask and goggles back on and painstakingly moved to gather up the corpses of his fallen comrades. “Until we meet again… Rainbow Dash. Farewell,” he said as he took flight out the doorway and away from the scene.

Rainbow Dash was left to her thoughts. However, she could hardly even process what just happened. She’d barged into the house fearing the worst… to unfortunately be right. She’d seen absolutely horrible things that nopony her age should have EVER laid eyes on, which was bad enough… It only got even more horrible as she had her mother die in her hooves as the heartless murderer watched in triumph.

The killer apologized for purposefully stabbing her mother to death. He revealed his face and told her to learn how to fight to avenge her mother or die. He’d even revealed his face to her, and told her to remember it along with his voice. It didn’t make sense. Why would a cold-blooded murderer do all these things? Whatever the reason was, it mattered little now.

Rainbow saw her mother’s killer with her own eyes. He had the nerve to dare Rainbow to find him and try to get revenge. He was a sadistic monster who fed off of misery, and he needed to be stopped... Him and all the bad ponies of this... Dark Hoof Seven tribe. She wasn’t satisfied with telling the police so as to see him locked up. They probably wouldn’t catch him anyway. No… she wanted him dead. She wanted to see him die in the same brutal fashion that he killed Daring Do, her mother. In leaving her alive, going so far as to torment her by telling her to find him, she wouldn’t have been satisfied with anything less. And if anypony WAS going to make that happen, it was going to be her. He’d pay for the innocent lives he destroyed.

But then, what about that necklace? Daring Do said herself that it was special… that it had the ability to help other ponies… What did she mean? And why is it that “bad ponies” wanted it so badly that they… they KILLED somepony for it, and didn’t even proceed to take it when they had the chance? How was she going to develop the skills necessary to get revenge? How was she going to break the news of Daring Do’s demise to anypony else?

The questions intertwined in Rainbow’s young, grief-stricken mind, addling her to no conceivable end for a foal as she continued to grieve over the loss of her beloved caretaker, role model, and only parent. She was an orphan once again. However, she was sure of a couple things: One, if that necklace was special to Daring Do, then that was more than enough reason to keep it… She’d keep it and wear it proudly… in her memory. Two, she was going to avenge her mom… somehow. The killer himself had handed her the sword her mother probably used to defend herself. She’d cherish that sword, too. Not only because it was her mother’s weapon… but also because it would become hers. It would additionally be her tool for raining hot vengeance on that miserable manure-stain of a pony. His death by this sword was all too fitting an end for him.

Rainbow still had a situation at hand: she needed to give her mother’s body a proper resting place. She barely had the strength in her to carry Daring out of the house herself. But she didn’t want to leave the sword or the necklace there for anyone to take them… she needed them. Rainbow walked into her mother’s room and looked around. She saw a large bed, a dresser that had to be at least five times her size, and an open closet with multiple jackets and hats that were identical to one another. She took flight and looked on top of the dresser to see the necklace resting on top of a safe. She admired its captivating beauty and radiant shine. It sure was in an excellent condition for an old artifact Daring had found in a cave. She picked it up. The instant she did, the Element began to glow. It levitated out of her hooves, shocking her. The necklace disappeared in a flash. Rainbow was scared that she’d done something to lose it and was about to begin searching for it. Another light flashed from below her. She looked down to see the necklace had adorned itself around her neck.

“Wh… what the hay…?” she murmured as she grabbed the necklace. She tried to take it off, but she couldn’t. Instead, it disappeared again, befuddling her even more.

“You… you are the one… You are worthy… to wear the Element of Loyalty,” said a mysterious, majestic voice. “By taking this necklace into your possession, you have accepted a new mission; find the other Elements and the ponies worthy of them and unite the world… in Harmony…”

“Who said that!? Where are you? What’s an ‘Element of Loyalty’?” Rainbow asked as she looked around to find herself completely alone. She’d have to figure it out later, as she still had the task of taking Daring’s body away. She landed and walked back into the war-torn living room to see her mother still lying there, motionless. The sight hit the filly with a tsunami of sadness. She wanted to cry some more… to empty the deep well of anger and despair that had been built inside of her. But she could not. She had to be strong now. There was nopony there to comfort her in her time of need… and nopony she wanted there. The only pony capable of comforting her was dead, her corpse resting directly in front of her.

“I’ll get them, mom… no matter how many times you told me you weren’t innocent… *sniffle* you were. They… they won’t get away with this… I promise you…” Rainbow muttered. She looked around and located the sheath of the sword on the floor on other side of the room. She picked it up, and hesitated after turning around. She was scared out of her mind of approaching Daring Do’s body. She’d never seen anything larger than a fly dead before. This was a horrible extreme. The filly steeled herself and slowly cantered over to Daring. She picked up the sword and put it back in its sheath.

*knock knock*

Rainbow was apprehensive about opening the door. It could have been the killer coming back. Maybe he remembered he forgot to take the necklace and was coming back for it. But then, he did specifically say that he considered her to be the one to have it… and he didn’t try to kill her then. Before she got too lost in thought, Rainbow took the bloodied sword out of its sheath and slowly approached the door. Her heart was pumping a mile a minute as she drew closer. She took a deep breath and broke into a short gallop until she was at the door. She opened it ever so slowly, the surprisingly heavy sword clenched in between her teeth. She then threw the door open, prepared for attack, but was surprised by the pony standing in the doorway. It was a black colt. Specifically, it was Thunderlane, accompanied by a full-grown stallion, both of whom were wearing the same expression of shock that she'd had as she dropped the sword onto the floor...